Page 12 of Joven's Bride
It was daybreak at the starport where the passenger shuttle would leave off four passengers and pick up a couple more.
Carly’s com-tablet beeped at the exact minute Joven had scheduled it with her. She smiled warmly as his familiar face filled the screen. He smiled as well, and they both switched their coms to project their full-sized holographic images.
Her time with him was the best part of her days. She just wanted the trip to be over so they could finally be together in substance rather than holographic projection. “It’s so good to see you, Joven,” she murmured as his image appeared to be facing her. “How is your job going?”
“It’s peaceful compared to the chaos of war and chasing down slavers. We have a crew of five, and we cruise around the system in a star jumper to make sure that no more poachers or smugglers land on Glasica,” he said. “All we’ve seen so far is the stars and empty space, aside from routine space traffic. But that is why I came to Glasica. It will be a good place to raise our children.” He gave her a sexy smirk that had her blushing as her body responded.
Carly knew from the beginning that the genetics used by the Narovian Interstellar Matchmaking Service gave them a near perfect record of matching their clients to their soulmates. They specialized in races like the felines who biologically mate for life and cyborgs who have nearly the same criterion for choosing a mate. Their physiology chose for them.
It wasn’t fate, and it wasn’t magic. It was biology.
Carly thoroughly researched the phenomenon when she made her application to the matchmaking service. She’d read first-hand accounts of women from Earth about their encounters with their Narovian feline mates. They met by chance, but they all told the same story of how they were overcome by an intense need to mate within minutes of exposure to the feline pheromones.
That was a little scary to think about fucking a complete stranger like that. However, after the mating frenzy subsided, their relationships evolved into stable, loving partnerships.
Carly wouldn’t have to face that level of attraction with a stranger. She and Joven already had a month of exchanging video mail. They had another month and a half of three months of real-time holovid chats to get acquainted before they came together face to face.
“That’s fine with me,” Carly told him, caressing his handsome face with her eyes. “I had enough excitement to last the rest of my life when the Drayids attacked Earth.”
“The Drayids will be paying reparations for the next century. They will be barred from trade in Alliance territory even longer.”
The Drayids had slipped through Alliance surveillance and got that close to Earth because they had disguised their battleship as a star freighter bound for Mars City, the Alliance Starbase. It had been secret, until their existence was revealed to Earth.
“Glasica is too far for them to come and too poor as far as they were concerned. Not enough people and resources to interest them. But enough for the settlers to have a good life here,” he told her.
For a couple minutes, they just stood drinking in the sight of each other. “I can understand about the distance. I am already wishing away the time until we can be together.”
“Are the other passengers telling you that you are crazy to marry a feline cyborg shifter?” he asked with the familiar sexy smirk.
“Not to my face, but I have overheard some comments to that effect. I didn’t tell them you are a shifter too,” she sighed. “Your big cat persona is pretty scary, but not to me because I know it’s you.” The last was spoken with a tenderness that touched him deeply.
“And I would never hurt you,meomee,”Joven assured her. “Just the sound of your voice tells me you are indeedmeomee.It fills me with such longing to have you in my arms… To make you mine.”
Carly gave him a rueful smile. “Seeing you like this, standing right in front of me, does the same for me. The projection is so realistic. I feel like I should be able to reach out and touch you.”
“Soon,meomee, soon.”
